At the start of men’s cross country runner Matt Durgin’s career, he had no intentions of becoming a collegiate runner.

Durgin’s introduction to running was in the seventh grade when he joined the cross country team after a friend asked him if he was interested in running. The decision to join led Durgin to lettering each season, as well as becoming a four-time state qualifier.

The impact of Durgin has already been felt by the men’s cross country team, as he finished first for the Yellow Jackets in the Presidents’ Athletic Conference Championships in late October.

Durgin’s training isn’t really different from others, but his dedication and discipline to them are what help set him apart.

“It goes back to what you do in the summer. For me, I like to do a lot of millage. It is something that can be hard because I don’t have people to run with all of the time, but I have to stay disciplined and run a lot of miles during the summer,” said Durgin. “My technique is that if you push through the hard workouts it’ll be a lot easier come conference and regionals.”

Head coach Chris Hardie pointed to one unique trait about Durgin that Hardie has observed in just the few months that Durgin has been on campus.

“He brings a really deep faith, so as a Christian that is a big segment in our team. We don’t push faith on anybody, everybody is on a different level on their faith journey,” said Hardie. “He comes in pretty confident in his faith, willing to share. We have a Wednesday [team] devotion that isn’t highly attended; we will meet and go over scripture and he is vital to that group.”

Hardie looks at Durgins faith with much appreciation when he can see the commitment on the course and in the Bible. Durgin added to Hardie’s comments and explained that his faith is a large part of not only his life, but also when he hits the course.

“Faith is definitely something that keeps me motivated when I run,” said Durgin. “I always want to give my best in every race, so I like to give glory to God when I do well and also be thankful when I don’t have a good race. Keeping God central in my running is important.”

Once the Winfield, West Virginia, native realized that he could run at a collegiate level, he began the search that eventually brought him to Waynesburg.

“I looked at a lot of [Division III] and [Division II] schools, especially ones that had cross country and track programs,” said Durgin. “Waynesburg felt like the best fit because they had a good nursing program. They had the small school environment, I liked that. They also had a lot of Christian organizations, and things like that.”

Hardie learned of Durgin’s interest and immediately began the recruiting process.

“He probably got some letters from us during his sophomore, maybe even freshman year,” said Hardie. “Then we put him on a target list, where we just followed his career. By his junior year, he submitted a survey to us that showed he was interested. We invited him to campus for an overnight, and this process allowed him to see what campus was like.”

Now that Durgin has almost a season of experience running for Waynesburg under his belt, Hardie and his staff are encouraged by some of the tendencies that Durgin possesses.

“The one thing that he has that we don’t see in freshman a lot is consistency, he hits his paces every time,” Hardie said. “We found with him that he uses every week to get better, the extra mileage is starting to work for him. It was because of that consistency early on, that allowed him to grow [so fast].”

During his time at Waynesburg, Durgin plans to study nursing and, following graduation, he hopes to land a job in the orthopedic nursing field.

With the first cross country season coming to a close, Hardie and Durgin are both hopeful from more success in the future.

“Regionals are a big test, it’s the biggest race of the year. We’ll get to see him in a big field to see what that looks like, with about 250 runners in the next race,” said Hardie. “It will be nice to see him in that environment and see if he gets even better. Or we will see if his confidence falls, and then we will know if we will have to get him amped up for a race like that.”

Durgin plans to stay focused on regionals for now, but does have a few goals for the future as well.

“[At regionals], I would like to be under 28-minutes and I think that our team is shooting for 25th place or higher. I was 26th at PAC’s this year and the top 21 get onto the podium, so I’d like to be inside that number next year and of course [continue] to improve my time,” said Durgin. “[Ultimately], continue improving and hopefully become an All-American one day, but we’ll have to see what comes. Just take it one day at a time, that is my philosophy.”